CRISTO RAUL. READING HALL THE DOORS OF WISDOM

THE HISTORY OF THE POPES

THE POPES OF THE THIRD CENTURY

SAINT ZEPHYRINUS—AD. 202

ZEPHERINUS, a Roman, the son of Abondio, was created pontiff A.D. 202. According to Anastasius, who wrote the Life of this pope, he ordered that all the priests living with a bishop should be present whenever he should officiate; that no patriarch, primate, or Archbishop should pass sentence upon a bishop without the authority of the pope; that all Christians should communicate at Easter; that the patens and chalices should not be of wood, as till then they had been, but of glass. Some writers say that Saint Zephyrinus ordered them to be neither of wood nor of glass, but of gold or silver.

Saint Zephyrinus condemned the Montanists, the Phrygians, the Cataphrygians, and the Encratites. Tertullian also was excommunicated, and endeavored to avenge himself by sarcasm, unworthy of so lofty a genius, which pride rendered heretical. It was under Saint Zephyrinus that the famous Origen went to Rome to visit the first, and most celebrated of all the Christian churches. During the seventeen years of his pontificate, Saint Zephyrinus wholly devoted himself to maintaining the purity of the faith and discipline in the clergy. By the prudent counsels of Zephyrinus, Natalis, who had professed the heresy of Theodotus, the currier, so fully and frankly recanted that the pontiff received him into the communion of the faithful, and exempted him from canonical penalties.

Saint Zephyrinus, in four ordinations, created thirteen bishops, thirteen priests, and seven deacons. He governed the Church nearly seventeen years. He was buried in the cemetery called after the name of Calixtus, his successor, on the Appian Way.

Saint Zephyrinus had an especial esteem for Clement, that Platonic philosopher who became a Christian, and who taught in the school of Alexandria. Clement had a great number of disciples who afterwards ranked among the best masters; among them were Origen, and Alexander, Bishop of Jerusalem. Clement died about the year 217. The most celebrated of his works is An Exhortation to the Pagans, the object of which is to expose the absurdity of idolatry; the Pedagogue, a master who conducts the pupil from childhood to manhood in the way to heaven: and the Stromata, a collection of miscellanies in eight books. He wrote this book to serve him as a collection of memoranda when his memory should fail him.

Clement, who well knew the pagans, has judged them more favorably than many of the other Fathers, though he conceals neither their errors nor their vices.

Tertullian, priest of Carthage, died towards the close of the reign of Saint Zephyrinus. His works are of two kinds —those which he wrote before and after his separation from Rome. Among those of the former class is his Apology for the Christians, which is considered one of the most precious monuments of Catholic antiquity. Fleury, among other details, gives the following extracts from Tertullian:

"We do not", says he, "entreat on his behalf gods which exist not, the dead, and statues which he can command; but we invoke, for the health of the emperors, the eternal God, the true God, the living God. Bareheaded, with uplifted eyes, and hands outstretched towards heaven, we pray for all the emperors, and we ask that they may have long life, a tranquil feign, safety in their houses, valor in their armies, fidelity in the senate, honesty in the people, and rest for every one. All that man or emperor can need, I can only ask of Him who has the power to grant it, to whom I offer the one sacrifice that he hath commanded, the prayer that proceeds from a pure heart, an innocent mind, and the inspiration of the Holy Ghost; and not a few grains of incense or of gum, or a few drops of wrie, or the blood of some paltry animal, and, what is still worse, an evil conscience.

"We pray, not by the genius of Caesar, but by his health, which is more august than his genius. Know ye not that geni are demons? Neither will I call the emperor God, because I will not lie, and because I respect him too much to make a mockery of him. I am willing to call him Lord, but only when I am not compelled to say Lord and God are equivalent. For me, and equally for the emperor, there is but one Lord, who is all-powerful and eternal.

"The Christians are denounced as public enemies, because they do not pay false and vain honors to the emperors; because, professing the true religion, they daily enact their part in the public rejoicings rather by the feelings of their hearts than by debauchery. Great honor, surely, is paid to princes by setting out hearths and tables in the public streets for the banquet, and turning the whole city into a public house, to mingle wine and mire, and go about in companies committing insolences! Can public joy be only expressed by public shame? Are we culpable in praying for and rejoicing in our emperors in pure, sober, and modest guise?

"How many cruelties do you not still exercise against the Christians, whether from your own inclination or in obedience to the laws! How often does it not happen that the populace, even without awaiting your orders, throw stones at us, or set fire to our houses! Have you ever remarked that we have never done aught to revenge ourselves for so much injustice, and an animosity that pursues us even unto the death? Yet a single night, and a few torches, would enable us abundantly to avenge ourselves, il it were allowable to us to repay evil with evil; and if we chose openly to declare ourselves your enemies, could we not command strength and troops? Are the Moors, the Parthians, or any other nation, more numerous than all the nations of the world? We are but a people of yesterday, and we abound everywhere, in your cities, your hamlets, your camps, your castles, your tribes, your palaces, the senate-house, and the public square; in every place we have taken possession, leaving you nothing but your temples."

Saint Justin himself is here surpassed in the sacred struggle against intolerance.

Unhappily, Tertullian did not persist in such excellent sentiments. He became a Montanist; and he left that sect and became the founder of a new heresy.

Saint Zephyrinus enjoyed the success of Tertullian, and no doubt pardoned his error before his death.

  SAINT CALIXTUS I—A.D. 219

SAINT CALIXTUS I, son of Domitian, was a member of the family of Domitia. He was created Pope in the year 219. There was no persecution during his pontificate; nevertheless there were some martyrs. Those calamities, however, must not be attributed to the emperor himself; for it may be said of Alexander Severus that, though a pagan by education, he was Christian by disposition, and was one of the princes who go the most honor to Roman history and to our common humanity. It is affirmed that he admired the maxims of Christianity, and that one of those maxims—"We should not do unto others what we would not that they should do unto us"—was by his order written in large letters in his palace. He venerated Christ as one worthy of divine honors, and had our Saviour's image among his Lares, or household gods, as the image of a benefactor to humanity, and would have erected a temple to him in the year 222 (more than a century before Constantine), had not the obstinate pagans objected that if that were done, the altars of their false gods would be deserted. There is much in this history that is consecrated to the glory of Christ, illustrative of Chrisian doctrine, and destructive of that feeling of surprise affected by Protestantism when it is compelled to recognize the great power of Cartholicism under Constantine. It was not in the power of that prince to postpone the striking homage that he paid to the Catholic worship.

Caesarotti, in the article which he devotes to Calixtus, asks whether the violent death of that pontiff is to be attributed to a humane and generous emperor; he replies that the emperor was at a distance from Rome, and ignorant of the causes of that death. And he goes still further, and attributes it to the prefects of the city, and especially to the consulters of the law. Of these officers he says: "They formed a very powerful order; professional pedantry urged them to display their zeal for the old laws, and to sacrifice the law of conscience to the written law." This pontiff perished during a popular insurrection, and ecclesiastical memoirs state that he was thrown from a window and into a well. He did not die on the spot, and men daily went down to maltreat the glorious martyr, who made no complaint. The well is still to be seen in the Church of Saint Calixtus, of the Benedictine Fathers, near that of Saint Mary in Trastevere, which is itself built on the former site of the house. That little church, built with the permission of the emperor, was renewed by Gregory III, about the year 740; then it was granted to the Benedictine monks, with the palace built by the Cardinal Moroni, in exchange for the monastery which they possessed on the Quirinal, where the Quirinal Palace now stands.

It is related that this pope expressly ordered that priests, on receiving holy orders, should make a vow of continence, and should never contract marriage; that marriage should not be contracted between relatives, and that the fast of the ember days of the year, which in some countries was neg­lected, should be strictly observed. He re-established, on the Appian Way, the cemetery which takes the name of Saint Calixtus, and which subsequently has received the bodies of a hundred and seventy-four thousand martyrs and of forty-six pontiffs. From this we may calculate how vast a number of bodies must be contained in the other cemeteries in Rome.

In five ordinations this pontiff created eight bishops, sixteen priests, and four deacons. He governed the Church about; four years.

SAINT URBAN I—A.D. 223

ON the death of Saint Calixtus, Saint Urban I, a noble Roman, was created pontiff, in 223. He baptized many persons belonging to the Roman nobility, among others Saint Cecilia and her husband Valerianus. He ordered that all the vessels used in the sacred mysteries should be of silver. It is not astonishing, therefore, that silver chalices were in use before this pontificate. On this subject Novaes tells us that when Saint Boniface was asked whether it was allowable to celebrate with vessels of wood, he replied: "Formerly golden priests used wooden chalices; now wooden priests use golden chalices."

It was Urban who ordered that Christians should receive the chrism only from the hands of the bishops, whence has been mistakenly attributed to him the institution of the sacrament of confirmation. It is as certain that that sacrament was instituted before Saint Urban as it is that Christ and the apostles preceded that pope.

It s affirmed that he ordered that the thrones of the bishops should be made higher, so that they might judge the faithful; and it was on that account that those thrones are also called tribunals.

He suffered martyrdom in the year 230 under Alexander Severus. But let us not on that account withdraw the praises we have bestowed upon that emperor. Caesarotti has well explained that, when that prince was absent from Rome, men who were obstinately attached to the old laws irritated the populace and consigned the Christians to martyrdom.

Many preceding decrees allowed the maltreatment of the Christians under various pretexts, and the imprisonment of Romans who conspired against the state. The condemnation, therefore, could easily mention some legally punishable offence without saying that the only real cause of proceeding against the accused was because they were Christians.

In five ordinations Saint Urban I created eight bishops, five priests, and nine deacons.

He was buried n the cemetery of Pretextatus, on the Appian Way, near the gate of Saint Sebastian.

The head of that pontiff is venerated in the Church of Saint Mary, in the Trastevere, in the chapel of the Madonna of Strada Cupa. which was richly ornamented and consecrated by Cardinal the Duke of York, commendatory of that basilica. The ceremony took place on the 14th of November, 1762. That chapel had been given by the chapter to that cardinal, who was brother of Prince Charles Edward. His Eminence was the last of the Stuarts, and died in 1788. He had on his medals the title of Henry IX, King of England.

SAINT PONTIANUS—A.D. 230

SAINT PONTIANUS, son of Calpurnius, was created pontiff on the 26th of June, A.D. 230. Some learned men think, with Platina, that it was this pope who ordered the singing of the Psalms in the Church, both by day and by night; but other writers maintain that the custom is older. It is possible that Saint Pontianus published a decree on this subject, for the better regulation of the ecclesiastical practice. This latter is the opinion of Sangallo.

In ten ordinations Saint Pontianus created six bishops, six priests, and five deacons. He governed the Church more than five years.

His body, martyrised in the island of Tavolato, near the island of Sardinia, was removed to Rome, by order of Pope Saint Fabian, and buried in the cemetery of Calixtus. His martyrdom has been likened to that of Saint Stephen, as he was stoned to death. There is a beautiful legend that the stones and rocks hurled at him all miraculously fell short. As night fell, Saint Pontianus cried aloud: "Lord Jesus, wilt thou not give me also the martyr's crown?" Instantly the next stone struck him on the forehead, and he fell dead. Two epistles are attributed to him, but they are evidently apocryphal.

SAINT ANTERUS—A.D. 235

WE find, as the next sovereign pontiff, Saint Anterus, a Greek, said to have been born at Petilia, in Calabria. Graecia Magna, but, according to other authors, at Policastro. He was the son of Romulus, who is said to have been born n Sardinia. Anterus was elected pope on the 9th of September, A.D. 235. He governed the Church only one month. He created one bishop, for the city of Fondi. He suffered martyrdom because he ordered greater strictness in searching into the acts of the martyrs, exactly collected by the notaries appointed by Saint Clement I.

Anterus was interred in the cemetery of Calixtus, on the Appyan Way, whence his ashes were removed to the Church of Saint Sylvester, in the Campus Martius. They were discovered on the 17th of November, 1595, when Pope Clement VIII rebuilt that church, which had fallen into ruins.

SAINT FABIAN—A. D. 236

IT is said that the electors decided in favor of Fabian, son of Fabius, who was created pope on the 13th of January, 236, because a dove, after hovering about the heads of all present, during the election, at length alighted on the head of Fabian. The fact is stated by Eusebius. To the seven deacon-notaries appointed by Saint Clement I to collect the acts of the martyrs, Fabian added seven subdeacons, to assist the former in a task so pious and so important. He appointed seven other deacons of a superior order to oversee those of whom we have spoken. They were ordered to take care that the acts were written out with details, and not given in the few scant words to which they had been confined.

Fabian divided Rome into seven Rioni—quarters or districts—as Augustus had divided it into fourteen. That ancient civil division did not please Fabian; while in that which he adopted, the seven deacons who were charged to oversee the seven other deacons, and the seven subdeacons, could take care of the poor in the seven churches. In this ecclesiastical division originated the titles of the Cardinal-deacons, who at first were entitled Regionari. It has been stated that Fabian gave orders that on Holy Thursday the old oil of the holy chrism should be burned. It has also been stated that Fabian decreed that no one should be ordained priest at an earlier age than thirty years; that, in civil judgment, no priest could be either accuser, or judge, or witness; that the faithful should communicate three in every year; that priests who had become idiots as the result of illness should no longer be allowed to celebrate the Holy Sacrifice: and that marriage should be prohibited to the faithful to the fourth degree of consanguinity. While recounting these regulations, Novaes adds: "Nevertheless, I believe— although the sovereign pontiffs of the primitive Christian centuries must have made provision for the proper regulation of the Church— I believe and shall always assert that the decretals attributed to the pontiffs earlier than Saint Siricius, that is to say, earlier than the year 385, are apocryphal, with the exception of four decretals in the first three centuries. Those four are—one by Saint Clement, and three by Saint Cornelius. To these we may add some fragments of other genuine documents: viz., fragments of two decretals of Saint Stephen (year 253); of one of Saint Dionysius (year 250); of another of Saint Felix I (269); in the fourth century, two of Saint Julius (year 337); the twelve of Saint Liberius (year 352); and eight of Saint Damasus (year 366); all indicated by Monsignor Bartoli."

The same prelate also mentions, in his nineteenth chapter, the ninety-seven apocryphal decretals forged by Isidore Mercator, and attributed to the pontiffs who preceded Saint Gregory the Great, the sixty-fifth pope.

Stunt Cyprian, speaking of Saint Fabian, calls him an excellent man, and says that the glory of his death was conformable to the purity, the holiness, and the integrity of his life. He had the glory to banish from the Church a new heretic, Privatus, an African, who was previously condemned by a council for enormous faults, and who endeavored by an insidious humility to impose upon the candor of the pope.

Many modern waiters have maintained that Saint Fabian baptized the Emperor Philip and his son, also named Philip; in which case Philip, the father, would have been the first Christian emperor. To those who, in common with so many historians who are supported by documents possessing the confidence and respect of all Christendom, maintain that Constantine was the first Christian emperor, Novaes replies, as do some other authors, that the two opinions are not necessarily irreconcilable. He argues that Philip might have been the first Christian emperor, and yet not have dared publicly to profess his Christianity. In all things there are such gradations. Always it is by gradations more or less distant that a free and noble conduct develops itself in the history of a people: there have always been precedents, more or less concealed, which have given the examples, and strengthened the courage of some successor who has been assisted by more favorable circumstances.

Caesarotti does not admit the Christian sentiments attributed to Philip, and he thinks that to doubt them is by no means to do any wrong to our holy religion. He who was a traitor to his prince, and the assassin of his pupil, would be no very desirable acquisition to the Christians; and if Philip had really desired to become a genuine Christian, his first step should have been to take off his crown and trample it under his feet, obtained, as it had been, by so much perfidy. Then he should have passed his whole remaining days in the Station of the Weeping. (The Weepers' Station, or Station of Tears, was the first of the four degrees of the canonical penance. The penitents could not enter the church; they waited in the porch, covered with sackcloth, confessing their sins, and begging with tears and supplications that the faithful would pray for God's pardon for them.)

In five ordinations Fabian created either eleven or fourteen bishops, twenty-two priests, and seven or eight deacons. The different numbers are stated by different authors.

He governed the Church about fourteen years.

Having suffered martyrdom in the seventh persecution under Decius, this pope was buried in the cemetery of Saint Calixtus. He is reckoned among the canons regular.

The Holy See remained vacant during more than sixteen months, as the persecution under the Emperor Decius became more and more cruel. In this interval, between the death of Fabian and the elect on of his successor, the first of the antipopes made his appearance. His name was Novatian. With him began the first schism of the Church. Unfortunately, Novatian, who died at Rome in the pontificate of Sixtus II, had, during nearly two centuries, successors who were attached to that fatal schism which was extinguished by Celestine I.

Fabian kept up a correspondence with Origen, born at Alexandria in 185. Clement of Alexandria was his master. Both sexes crowded to the school of Origen. Few authors have been more industrious than he was, and few men have been admired for as long a time, and no one has been more, severely attacked and censured than he was during his life and has been since his death.

His works are an Exhortation to Martyrdom, and Commentaries on the Holy Scripture, which he was perhaps the first to explain as a whole. He labored on an edition of the Scriptures in six columns, entitled Hexaples. In his book of Principia, he has been supposed to have borrowed his system from the philosophy of Plato.

We also owe to Origen the Treatise against Celsus. That enemy of the Christian religion had insolently published his Discourse on Truth, a discourse full of insults and calumnies. In none of his writings has Origen displayed so much of either Christian or profane science as in this; nor in any other work has he brought forward so many strong and solid proofs. It is considered the most perfect and well-written defence of Christianity that antiquity has bequeathed to us.

It is remarkable that the objections of Celsus are in most cases the same that are repeated by the philosophers of our age. Those copyists have not the merit of inventing errors and blasphemies; they are obliged to recur to the sophisms of sophists forgotten for sixteen centuries. Scarcely was Origen dead, when the disputes about his orthodoxy became stronger and warmer. Some Fathers defended him: others, including Saint Basil, and after him some of the commentators, aver that Origen did not think rightly as to the divinity of the Holy Ghost. Origen was condemned in the fifth general council. Saint Augustine wrote against the origenists.

SAINT CORNELIUS—A.D. 251

 Like many of his predecessors. Saint Cornelius was a Roman priest; he was the son of Castinus, or Calixtus, of the noble family of the Octavii, or of the Cornelii. Many authors include him among the regular canons. Cornelius, against his own will, was created pontiff A.D. 251, more than a year after the death of Saint Fabian, and he refused the sovereign dignity with an exemplary and humble generosity. Sixteen bishops, as well as the clergy and the people, were present at that election. He ordered that only those who could prove themselves professors of the true faith could put a cleric to his oath. An oath should be taken while fasting, and no one could be sworn at an earlier age than fourteen years.

Notwithstanding the persecution which raged so violently during the time of Saint Cornelius, there were at that time in Rome, as appears in a letter given by Eusebius, forty-six priests, who superintended the like number of parishes, seven deacons, seven subdeacons, forty-two acolytes, fifty-two exorcists, readers, and ostiaries, fifteen hundred widows, very many poor persons, and Christian cenobites; all these were properly supported by the Church. Besides these, there was an immense number of Christians. Tertullian, consequently, is justified in saying in his Apology that if, in his time, the Christians had migrated from the Roman Empire to other countries, their absence would have produced a sort of solitude.

In a Roman council, composed of sixty bishops, Cornelius excommunicated the antipope Novatian, a Roman priest, a pagan by birth, a Christian in appearance, and heretic from despair. All Novatian's sectaries were included in that excommunication. It was then taught that the Church could not receive into her bosom the fallen or relapsed, nor pardon their offence. The name of caduci was given to those who from fear of torture abandoned the doctrines of Christianity. The caduci were subdivided nto several distinct classes. Some were called sacrificati, because they had sacrificed to the idols; others, thurificati because they had offered incense in the pagan Sacrifices; others were called idolatri, because they recurred to the worship of the false gods; and others, again, libellatici because, becoming renegades to the Catholic faith, they paid money to redeem themselves from the penalty of being ignominiously led to the pagan altars, and on payment of the money were furnished by the magistrates with a libellus, or written certificate of protection. Of the libellatici there were several different classes. Among the caduci there was also a class called traditori (traitors), because, obeying the edicts of the tyrants, they gave up to the pagan judges some of the sacred vessels, or the books of prayer, or church ornaments, or were still more heinously guilty in furnishing the pagans with the names of the faithful. The schism of the Donati had its origin in the excommunications pronounced against bishops suspected of being traditori.

Among the bishops of that time, whether faithful or heretical, there were some who demanded that the caduci should be received again into communion without the enforcement of penance; while others maintained that they should not be received to penance itself, but should be rejected. Felicissimus a priest of Carthage, was for a time at the head of the relaxed party: and Novatian defended the rigorists, a kind of Jansenists of that time. This was in reality to deprive on the one hand those unfortunates of all trust in repentance, and to take from the Church, on the other hand, the divine faculty of pardoning. Cornelius, like a wise and moderate father, endeavored to reconcile the stern laws of discipline with the gentler promptings of compassion. He held out to penitent caduci the hand of mercy for the alleviation of their pain; but he would not allow of their return into the bosom of the Church until they had substantially proved the truth of their penitence by submitting to the wholesome severity of penance. Finally, he would not allow the complete rehabilitation of repentant caduci until they had complied with everything formally ordered by the Church, except when such were in danger of death. It is a touching spectacle, calculated to convert even the most hardened heart, to behold the inexhaustible tenderness of the Church towards the dying, and that disarmed hand which falls without smiting. A wise severity no longer interposes between the culprit and his judges; the priest, who until then has had so much power, no longer speaks with the same sternness, because the Master of both culprit and priest is about to speak, and because in the depths of our souls that Master has placed a certain disposition to that mixture of attrition and contrition which most frequently becomes a frank contrition, that is to say, a horror of sin caused by the love of God. whose goodness is so great that the sinner no longer fears the penalties which God's justice has ordained.

The decision of the pontiff was confirmed by that council of sixty bishops of which we have spoken, all approving of the excommunication of Novatian. In fact, to maintain that an apostasy is in some sort a matter of indifference, and that, immediately after having apostatized, a person may present himself just as one who had remained a faithful Christian, is to be wanting alike in courage, in faith, and in dignity. On the other hand, to maintain that, because an error has been committed, one should be forever reputed a pagan, and driven forth like some unclean creature, is to act with a harshness which Christianity should shrink from. These two opposite opinions equally fell under condemnation. Those who maintained them were no longer recognized as Christians, and the malignant men who advised so many evils became isolated and execrated by the Church and by humanity.

For some time the Christians had been permitted to breathe freely; but a pestilence having broken out, it was attributed to the disdain which Christians had manifested towards the false gods. Cornelius was too eminent a person not to be proscribed. He was exiled to Centum Cellae (now Civita Vecchia), where he found that crown of martyrdom which he desired. He merited it, says Saint Cyprian, for he had defied the fury of the tyrants in daring to accept a title which in these times was in itself equivalent to a sentence of death. A holy purity and a singular self-control and firmness characterized Saint Cornelius.

In two ordinations he created seven or eight bishops, one or four priests, and two or four deacons. He governed the Church one year, three months, and ten days. It was in that inconsiderable space of time that he achieved so much of good.

Fleury, speaking of the acts of Saint Corneous, says: "A council assembled at Rome, and, consisting of sixty bishops, condemned Novatian, his schism, and his cruel doctrine, which refused communion to those who had fallen, however penitent they should become."

From Civita Vecchia the body of Saint Cornelius was translated to the cemetery of Calixtus, and afterwards placed in the Church of St. Mary in Trastevere.

The Holy See was vacant during one month and five days.

SAINT LUCIUS I—A.D. 252

IT is probable that Saint Lucius I, a Roman priest, one of the companions in exile of Saint Cornelius, was elected at Civita Vecchia. He received the pontificate A.D. 252. He ordered that the ministers of the altars should never be chosen except from among men of the purest virtue, and that none of them should ever go unaccompanied into a house occupied by a woman, and that no priest should reside with a woman unless she should be of his nearest kindred. The penalty of the priest for breach of that regulation was deposition; for the woman, exclusion from the Church.

Lucius, who, like Saint Evaristus, was anxious for the greatness and dignity of the pontificate and the episcopacy, ordered that two priests and three deacons should constantly accompany the pontiff and the bishops as witnesses of their whole course of life. At the commencement of his pontificate, Lucius was sent into exile, but was soon afterwards recalled. This recall was caused, not by repentance, but merely by a caprice of cruelty, as the Eternal City was soon convinced. We are informed of this return by a letter of Saint Cyprian congratulating him. Lucius received that letter with a transport of joy. The motive of the congratulation was worthy of both saints. The African doubted not that God had granted the termination of an exile in an obscure place to bring back upon a more brilliant theatre one who was destined to perish before the people of Rome. Felicitations of this kind are to be found only in the epistles of Christians.

Saint Lucius receded the crown of martyrdom on the 5th March, A.D. 253.

In two ordinations this pope created seven bishops, four priests, and four deacons. He governed the Church a little more than five months. He was interred in the cemetery of Saint Calixtus.

SAINT STEPHEN I—A.D. 253

SAINT STEPHEN I, a Roman, was archdeacon of the Church of Rome under Saint Cornelius and Saint Lucius, and succeeded them in the power of the keys. The period of the reign of Saint Stephen was also that of the remarkable question whether it was necessary to repeat the baptism given by heretics, in the event of their return to the faith. The dispute arose between two of the most eminent Christians, one of whom, Stephen, was the foundation-stone, and the other a principal pillar, Saint Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage. The traditions of the Church held that baptism, even when conferred by heretics, preserved its sacramental characteristics, provided that in conferring it all the evangelical forms had been preserved; and, consequently, when a heretic passed from the temples of error to the true sanctuary of truth, the baptismal ceremony needed not to be renewed. Nevertheless, by degrees, in some of the provinces of Africa and Asia, the contrary custom had prevailed amongst holy bishops and learned men; and he received weight and even an extraordinary importance from the example and authority of Saint Cyprian, who had succeeded in causing it to be recognized in several councils on both those continents.

Saint Cyprian supported his opinion by arguments so plausible that Saint Augustine confessed that he himself would have been misled by them had not the decision of the Church served him as both argument and rule. Stephen, who, as became a pontiff, supported the ancient and more sound doctrine, treated the custom as an innovation, and to all the attacks of Saint Cyprian he opposed the invulnerable buckler of tradition He avoided parrying them by other arguments, lest on questions relating to the faith too much weight should be given to human reason, always too rash. Stephen was stern, more so than Cyprian had anticipated. Both were actuated by the same spirit, and strove, though by different ways, to attain to the same end. Cyprian was in error, yet sincerely sought the truth; Stephen was sternly strict, because he feared lest in respecting error he should nurture it.

The bishop said that in order to be convinced he awaited the sentence of the ecumenical Church. The pontiff anticipated it, and felt it within himself. Saint Augustine observes that his controversy displayed the two superior virtues of both disputants, charity and concord. Stephen, though persistent in his disapprobation of such a maxim, yet did not condemn its propagator, and sedulously avoided striking one of the most zealous supporters of the Church. Cyprian, in detaching himself from the head, had given the whole body a violent shock, yet ceased not to show himself faithfully united. He peacefully endured reproaches; he preached gentleness, docility, and integrity; and if he did not abandon the doctrines which he favored, he bore himself so humbly that it might be supposed that he had repudiated them. Those two illustrious men, divided upon the question of the first sacrament of the Church, were gloriously reunited to each other by the baptism of blood. Saint Vincent de Lerins says of Stephen I: "That great pope, whose prudence was as great as his sanctity, knew that piety can allow us to receive no other doctrine than that which is handed down to us from the faith of our predecessors, and that it is our duty to transmit it to others as faithfully and as purely as we have received it; that we are net to carry religion whithersoever we choose, but to follow it whithersoever it leads; that the property of Christian modesty is consistently to preserve the holy maxims left to us by our fathers, and not to hand down our own ideas to our posterity". What was the result of this dispute? That which is usual in such matters: the old faith was recognized and upheld, and the innovation was rejected. The question was not decided until the Council of Nice, where the view of Stephen triumphed.

Novaes details the names of the writers on the question as to the sufficient or insufficient baptism of heretics returning to the true faith. It was Agrippinus, Saint Cyprian's predecessor in the bishopric of Carthage, who first started this difficulty. Many authors, Italian, German, and French, have published important dissertations on the subject. Novaes declines to decide another question, namely, whether Stephen confined himself to threats or actually excommunicated Saint Cyprian.

In reply to Napoleon, on the subject of the marriage of Jerome Bonaparte, dated 25th June, 1805, Pius VII used these very words: "The disparity of creed between two baptized persons is not considered by the Church a fatal impediment to marriage, even though one of the parties be not in the Catholic communion."

In two ordinations in the month of December, Stephen created three or four bishops, six priests, and five deacons. He governed the Church four years and about six months. The executioners of the persecutors seized him at the moment when he was celebrating the Holy Sacrifice in the catacombs, and beheaded him on the very altar.

Innocent XII, among the presents that he made to Cosmos III, Grand Duke of Tuscany, who was at Rome during the Jubilee of 1700, gave him the chair of Saint Stephen I, which the grand duke sent to the cathedral of Pisa. It was under the invocation of this pope and saint that the celebrated Tuscan order of knighthood was founded, the "Order of Saint Stephen, Saint and Martyr."

The body of this saint was at first interred in the cemetery of Calixtus, but on the 17th of August, the year 762, it was removed to the Church of Saint Stephen and Saint Sylvester, which Paul I caused to be erected, and which is now called the Church of Saint Sylvester in Capite, because in it is preserved the head of Saint John the Baptist.

After the martyrdom of Saint Stephen, the Holy See re­mained vacant for twenty two days.

SAINT SIXTUS II—A.D. 257

IN the year 257 Saint Sixtus II, an Athenian, became pope. It is said that it was he who ordered that the bodies of Saint Peter and Saint Paul should be transported from the place where they rested to the catacombs during the raging of the persecution. Then the faithful regularly chanted the Psalms until the ninth hour in those sacred chambers.

The dispute relative to the baptism of heretics still existed, but there was no longer a fatal discord, to be deplored. Sixtus defended the doctrine of Stephen I. Dionysius, the celebrated Bishop of Alexandria, offered to mediate with Sixtus II on the Easter question, as Saint Irenaeus had with Victor. Sixtus yielded to the reasonings of Dionysius, and allowed the dissenting churches to keep to their customs until the question should be authoritatively settled by the sentence of a general council. The effect proved the wisdom of this idea. The Eastern Churches, perceiving that they were suspected of error, examined the question more attentively, and various African churches in succession, laying aside the new custom, adopted that of Rome—an event which led to the belief that Saint Cyprian himself had gradually abandoned his system.

The early years of the rule of the Emperor Valerian had promised some tranquillity to the Church, but his good inclination was perverted by a minister. The execution of Pope Saint Stephen presaged the fate of Sixtus. Macrinus, a man of great influence on account of his warlike skill and courage, was infatuated with the mysteries of magic. He persuaded the emperor that the true secret for rendering his reign prosperous lay in propitiating the demons by magical operations. At the same time he urged that those operations would be ineffectual unless accompanied by the extermination of the Christians, those chief enemies of the demons and magicians. Valerian's feelings towards the Christians were thus changed: his former love became hatred, and he gave orders for the destruction alike of the bishops, priests, and deacons. Saint Sixtus was arrested and led to execution. The order was that the bishops should be first executed. Saint Laurence, the principal of the deacons, was not on that day among the number of the victims. He, weeping, followed Sixtus, and exclaimed: "My father, whither are you going without your son? You are not accustomed to offer sacrifice without the assistance of a minister. How have I displeased you? Try me, whether I am worthy of the choice that you have made of me for the distribution of the blood of our Lord". Sixtus replied: "I do not abandon you, my son: but God reserves you for a greater combat. Doubt it not; in three days you will be with me". Having uttered those prophetic words, he ascended to heaven.

Saint Sixtus was buried n the cemetery of Pretextatus. Fleury thus relates the execution of Saint Laurence:

"However, the prefect of Rome, believing that the Christians had great treasure concealed, and desiring to ascertain the fact, caused Saint Laurence to be brought before him, as being, in his quality of archdeacon, the Christian treasurer also. When Saint Laurence was placed before him, the prefect said:

-'It is your common complaint that we treat you cruelly; there are no torments. I mildly ask you what entirely depends upon yourself to answer. It is stated that in your ceremonies the pontiffs offer libations in vessels of gold, that the blood of the victims is received in vessels of silver, and that, to illuminate your nocturnal sacrifices, your tapers are borne in golden candelabra. It is further stated that, to defray the expenses of these things, the brethren sell their inheritance, and often reduce their children to poverty. Bring forth these hidden treasures: your prince has need of them for the payment of his troops. I understand that it is your doctrine that you should "render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's"; and I do not suppose that your God coins money. When he came into the world he brought no money with him, but only words. Give us the money, and rest content with words.

- Saint Laurence calmly replied: 'I confess that our Church is rich; and the emperor has not such great treasures. I will show you what our Church has of the most precious; only give me a little time to put all in order, to make the calculation, and to draw up the statement.

"That reply satisfied the prefect, who, imagining that he was about to grasp the treasures of the Church, granted a delay of three days. During those three days Saint Laurence traversed the city, gathering together the poor who were supported by the Church, the halt, the lame, and the blind, of whom he knew more than any other person did. Having got them together, he took down their names, and drew them up in a line before the church. On the day appointed for the production of the Church treasures, he went to the prefect and said: 'Come and behold the treasures of our God; you will see a great courtyard filled with vessels of gold, and whole talents of gold heaped together beneath the galleries'. The prefect accompanied him, and, on beholding those paupers of hideous and sordid aspect, who importuned him for alms, he, with angry and threatening glances, turned to Saint Laurence, who mildly inquired: 'Why are you angry? The gold which you so ardently desire is a vile metal drawn from the earth, and is what causes so many crimes. The true gold is the light of which these poor people are the disciples; their bodily weakness is their spiritual advantage; the real diseases of our race are the vices and the passions; the great people of the time are the really wretched and contemptible people. Behold the treasures that I promised you, and to them I will add pearls and diamonds. You see these widows and virgins? They are the crown of the Church; make these riches profitable to Rome, to the emperor, and to yourself.'

-"Do you make sport of me thus?' said the prefect. 'I know that you Christians affect to despise death, and therefore I will not have you promptly killed'. Then he caused a framework of iron bars to be set over a slow fire, in order to take a longer time to burn the martyr to death. Saint Laurence was stripped and laid upon the gigantic gridiron. To the newly baptized Christians his countenance seemed to shine with an extraordinary brightness. When the martyr had lain thus for some time on one side, he said to the prefect: 'Tell them to turn me over; I am done enough on this side.' Then, looking up to heaven, he prayed to God for the conversion of Rome, and gave up the ghost. Some senators, converted by his example, carried his body on their shoulders, and he was buried near the Tiburtean road, in a grotto, on the 10th of August, A.D. 259."

But for the hasty cruelty of the prefect, the clergy of Rome would doubtless have named the courageous Saint Laurence as the successor in the pontificate of Sixtus I, and we should reckon that intrepid confessor of the faith among those who have occupied the chair of Saint Peter.

Shortly afterwards, Saint Cyprian received the crown of glory at Carthage.  

SAINT DIONYSIUS—A.D. 259

ON the 12th of September, A.D. 259, Saint Dionysius, born in Calabria, a priest of the Roman Church, was created pope. He rearranged the parishes of Rome, and re-established those institutions which had been disturbed by Valerian's persecutions.

Saint Basil calls Dionysius a man illustrious for fidelity to the faith and for virtues of every kind; and the same is said of this pope by his namesake, Dionysius, Bishop of Alexandria, whom Saint Anastasius speaks of as an admirable prelate. Pope Dionysius had so long and perfect an acquaintance with the doctrines of the Church that he might have served as the referee of an ecumenical council. During the dispute about the baptism of heretics he adhered to the decision of Stephen.

The city of Caesarea, in Cappadocia, having been sacked by the barbarians, Pope Dionysius, faithful to the generous traditions of his predecessors, sent to the churches there both consolation and means to redeem Christians from slavery, which circumstance caused the people to bless the memory of that pontiff, and to hold his letters in great veneration. Nevertheless, the harmony which had existed between Dionysius of Rome and Dionysius of Alexandria was on the point of being disturbed on account of a serious error of the latter. He undertook to refute with some warmth the heresy of Sabellius, who recognized in God no distinction of persons. Some believed, or pretended to believe, that in combating that error Dionysius of Alexandria had fallen into another that was no less blameworthy—that of supposing the Son not to be consubstantial with the Father. The pontiff wrote to him, and from the explanations which were given there resulted, as the pontiff hastened to acknowledge in the tenderest terms, a complete satisfaction. Gallienus commanded that persecution should cease, and declared it his pleasure that every one should freely follow his own creed. The pontiff, after a long life, holily employed, died A.D. 269. He governed the Church ten years, five months, and a few days.

In two ordinations he created seven bishops, twelve priests, and six deacons. He was interred in the cemetery of Calixtus.

After his decease the Holy See was vacant four days.

SAINT FELIX I—A.D. 269

THE successor of Saint Dionysius, Saint Felix I, was the son of Constantius. He ordered, or perhaps only confirmed the custom, that Masses, termed memorials, should be celebrated on the tombs of the martyrs, and that the altars should be consecrated and have relics of martyrs placed in them. He also prescribed the rite for the dedication of churches. Felix continued to be watchful respecting the false doctrines of the innovators who endeavored to corrupt the purity of the faith. Just as Christians were deploring the wounds inflicted on the Church by the heresiarch Sabellius, there appeared a new assailant, Paul of Samosata, Bishop of Antioch. He regarded religion only as the instrument of avarice, luxury, and vanity. Licentious and inflated with worldly pride, a theatrical performer rather than a sacred orator, a rapacious priest and a speculating bishop, corrupt in his own acts, and the corrupter of his flock, he was a Christian by accident, and by adulation made himself almost a Jew, for, in his eagerness to obtain favor with Zenobia, Queen of Palmyra, who was inclined to Judaism, he Judaized his doctrines. The Council of Antioch, after having in three solemn assemblies convicted, condemned, and deposed that unworthy bishop, gave notice of that judgment to all the Catholic churches, and in particular, as was fit, to that of Rome. A letter was addressed to Pope Dionysius to instruct him of the judgment, but as that pope died before the letter reached Rome, it was receded by Felix. On that occasion the courageous pontiff sent to Maximus, Bishop of Alexandria, a celebrated synodal, quoted by the Council of Ephesus, which condemned both the heresy of Sabelius and that of Paul of Samosata.

This latter heretic having, as we have stated, been deprived of his episcopate, Domnus was elected in his place. Such was the fury of the Samosatian that he refused to vacate the episcopal palace; and he persisted until the Emperor Aurelian himself, on the application of the Eastern Churches, ordered him to be expelled from the palace, that it might receive the bishop who was recognised by the Church of Rome and the Italian bishops. This proves that Aurelian, at the commencement of his reign, showed himself indulgent to the Christians; and Eusebius observes that at that time one might have said that the devil was asleep. It was not long ere he awoke, and excited that same Aurelian to order a persecution. It was not universal, and we may add that it was not of long duration, but it added, nevertheless, very many new names to the martyrology.

Felix was the first victim; he perished with that firmness which so well became one who may be pointed out as the model of the most shining virtues.

In two ordinations, in the month of December, he made five bishops, nine priests, and five deacons. He governed the Church about five years. He was interred in the cemetery on the Aurelian Way, about two miles from Rome, where subsequently a church was consecrated by Felix II.

The fury of the persecutor increased at every instant, and no doubt it was for that reason that the Holy See remained vacant only four days.

A short time before the reign of Saint Felix, Catholicism had to lament the death of Saint Gregory the Thaumaturgist, Bishop of Neo-Caesarea. During the weak reign of Gallienus the Goths had overrun Thrace and Macedonia whence they spread into Asia and Pontus. They plundered and burned the Temple of Diana. These disorders gave occasion to some Christians to commit crimes. Suddenly Saint Gregory sent a canonical epistle to a bishop, pointing out different degrees of penance for those Christians who made themselves Goths by joining them in order to pillage. Fleury says: ''Even the enemies of the Church have called Saint Gregory another Moses, on account of his miracles."

SAINT EUTYCHIANUS—A.D. 275

SAINT EUTYCHIANUS, of Luni, a city of which now only the ruins are to be seen near Savona, in Tuscany, was the son of Marinus, or Martinus, names which have long been almost synonymous. He was created pope in the year 275.

According to Bury, this pope instituted the Offertory of the Mass; and he ordered the benediction, under certain circumstances, of branches of trees and of fruit. He decided that the faithful who had married before the women had been baptized should have the right to keep their wives or repudiate them. By that order he did not encroach upon the Roman laws of that time.

By his command, drunkards were excluded from communion until they should abandon their vice. He with his own hands buried above three hundred and forty-two martyrs. He ordered that no one should be buried but in a colobium, a kind of cloak of red color; previously they had been buried in white cloth, stained with their own blood.

In five ordinations, in the month of December, he created nine bishops, sixteen priests, and five deacons. He died on the 8th of December. A.D. 283, and was interred in the cemetery of Calixtus. but the body was afterwards removed to his native place, Luni.

The Holy See remained vacant seven days.

It was during the pontificate of Eutychianus that the heresiarch Manes appeared.

In the need of extending the faith, the Roman pontiffs recommended, zealous propagandism. The Christians tried those who were willing to listen to them. These latter were divided into two classes—one, the beginners, who had not yet learned the creed; the other, those who appeared entirely resolved upon following the maxims of Christianity. Belief was not left to mere chance; the beginners were instructed by degrees and according to their capacity. If a Gentile profited by that instruction, hands were laid upon him, and he became a catechumen. Those who were baptized were known as the faithful.

SAINT CAIUS—A.D. 283

SAINT CAIUS, a priest of Spalato, in Dalmatia, son of Saint Caius, priest, brother of Saint Gabinus, uncle of Saint Susanna, virgin and martyr, and nephew of the Emperor Diocletian, was created pontiff on the 16th of December, 283.

He confirmed the custom which required clerics to pass through the seven inferior orders of the Church during a fitting period before they could be created bishops. In five ordinations he created, in December, five bishops, twenty-five priests, and eight deacons, and he governed the Church twelve years, four months, and seventeen days. He died on the 22d of April, A.D. 296. He was a man of rare prudence and virtue. He was interred in the cemetery of Calixtus. The Holy See was vacant ten days.

Under this pontificate reigned the Emperor Maximianus. Desiring to pass into Gaul, he brought from the East a legion named the Theban, which was composed of Christians; and he wished to make them, like other soldiers, instruments in the persecution of the Christians. The regiment refused to obey. The emperor, to rest from the fatigues of the journey, stopped upon the Alps, in a place called Octodurum, now Martinach in the Valais. The Theban legion was then near there, at a place called Agaunus, at the foot of the mountain now known as the Great St. Bernard. The emperor, irritated by the disobedience of the Theban legion, ordered it to be decimated, and then repeated his orders that the rest should persecute the Christians. Decimation was a military punishment of offending soldiery. The Theban legion, on receiving this second order, began to exclaim throughout the camp that they would rather suffer the utmost extremities than do anything against the Christian religion. The emperor ordered them to be again decimated, and the survivors to be reduced to obedience. Every tenth man was again put to death, and the survivors encouraged each other to persevere.

They were principally encouraged by three of their officers, Mauritius, Exuperus, and Candidas, who exhorted them to follow the example of their comrades. Under the advice of their officers, the soldiers sent a remonstrance to the emperor. "We are your soldiers, lord," said the remonstrance, "but servants of God we confess it freely. To you we owe the service of war, to him the service of innocence; from you we receive pay, from him we receive life. We cannot obey you in renouncing God our Creator and Master, and yours also. If nothing be demanded from us that is offensive to him, we will obey you, as hitherto we always have done; otherwise we shall obey him rather than you. We offer you our hands against all enemies, be they whom they may: but we do not deem ourselves permitted to imbrue those hands in the blood of the innocent. We made an oath to God before we did so to you: you could not believe the latter oath would be kept, should we break the former one. You command us to search for Christians, that they may be punished: you have only to search after others; for ourselves, we confess God the Maker of all things, and Jesus Christ his Son. We have seen our companions slain, without pitying them; we even rejoiced that they had the honor to suffer for their God. Neither their death nor despair has led us to revolt; we are armed, yet we shall not resist, because we prefer to die innocent rather than live guilty."

Maximianus, despairing of being able to conquer such constancy, ordered that all the survivors of the legion should be put to death, and the other soldiers surrounded them to cut them to pieces. They made no resistance, but grounded their arms and presented their throats to their destroyers, and the ground was soon covered with their bodies. It is supposed that about six thousand men were thus destroyed, that being the usual number of the legions.

A veteran soldier, named Victor, who did not belong to that legion, and was out of the service, found himself, while on the road, in the company of those who had slain the martyrs and who were feasting and rejoicing over their plunder. They invited the veteran to eat with them, and told him exultingly all that had passed. Detesting alike their banquet and themselves, he turned to depart from them, when they asked him if he was not a Chrstian. He answered that he was and always would be. They instantly threw themselves upon him and put him to death.

SAINT MARCELLINUS—A.D. 296

THIS saint, Marcellinus, son of Projectus, a Roman, was, according to some, a Benedictine, and was created pontiff on the 3d of May, A.D. 296.

The Church never suffered more than at this terrible period. The vast edifice of idolatry, gradually ruined by the Christians, and in some of its parts destroyed, was ready to crumble to its very foundations. The heathen altars lacked flowers, ana the priests lacked victims; the aruspices no longer read in the entrails of slaughtered animals the signs and tokens of the future; the oracles were dumb, and the magicians were powerless. In such a state of things, it seemed as though all the gods of darkness made a last effort against the God of light. Diocletian, Maximianus, Galerius and Maximinus in succession, were the four chiefs of that infernal enterprise. Galerius, the most furious of them all, had taken from Diocletian the fatal sentence which ordered that cruel persecution, at once atrocious and universal, without truce and without pity. The churches were pulled down in most of the provinces; men and women, old men, children, and virgins were alike given up to the executioners. Heaven was peopled with martyrs, and earth, at the sight of such courage, warmed into a love for Catholicism. The persecutor hoped to destroy the religion of Christ, and all that fury only served to raise the throne of the faith upon the wreck and ruins of paganism.

The States subject to Rome, watered with the blood of the persecuted, only became the more productive of Christian branches. Tortures tore the bodies of the martyrs, but their souls, firmly embracing the faith, remained invulnerable and invincible. Nevertheless, there were some weak spirits that yielded to threats, and with whom self-love prevailed over religion; and it has even been said that among those weak ones was Marcellinus himself. The falsehood which was circulated on this head was adorned with all the circumstances which might give it an air of probability. It was pretended that the pontiff, perceiving his fault, presented himself as a suppliant before a council of three hundred bishops, assembled at Sinuessa. There, ran the story, the culprit confessed his error, and, weeping, demanded that he should be sentenced to the punishment he had incurred; and the council replied: "Pronounce sentence on thyself; the chief see cannot be judged but by itself." But in this statement every particular is false; it is now ascertained that the accusation is calumnious, and that the pontiff committed no fault. Saint Augustine, speaking of Petilius, author of that fable, says: "He calls Marcellinus a sacrilegious wretch; I declare him innocent. It is not necessary for me to weary myself to support my defence by proofs; for Petilius himself supports his accusation by no proof." In our own days that accusation has been repeated, and it has been said, with some foundation, too, that the Roman Breviary seems to support the tale, under the date of the 26th of April Muratori writes that it is so, and every one can convince himself of it. But Lambertini, before he was pope, speaking of the Breviary, or of its authority, says that the fact is false. He says: "1. All the ancient writers of the lives of the popes are silent on that head; 2. The Donatists could never prove the truth of their assertion, and were guilty of useless impostures," and he cites those words of Saint Augustine which we quoted above.

Baronius warns us on the subject that the Roman Church is not accustomed to have the acts of the saints read as if they were a gospel. Each, says Novaes, after Gelasus, may examine into things in conformity to the rule given by Saint Paul when he said: "Prove all things; hold fast to that which is good". The fall of that pontiff is denied by Schelstrate, Roccaberti, Pierre de Marca, Pierre Constant, Papebrock, Natalis Alexander, Pagi, Aguirre, Sangallo, and Xavier de Marco, a Jesuit. The last-mentioned writer has put forth that denial in a very important work.

Thus, according to the testimony of Theodoret, it is proved that Marcellinus was distinguished for the firmness of his courage; and the imputation against him was sustained only by Petilius and the sectarians of his time. The early Donatists never reproached the Church with such a fall of her head, eager as they were to support their own evil cause by collecting even the slightest errors of Catholic bishops, and especially of pontiffs. Everything leads to the belief, after Tillemont, that Marcellinus received the crown of martyrdom. He was interred in the cemetery of Priscilla, on the Salarian Way, near the Salarian bridge. According to Novaes, the Holy See was vacant only six months and twenty-four days; but, according to the Diario, the vacancy lasted nearly four years. In two ordinations, in the month of December, this pope created five bishops, four priests, and four or five deacons. He governed the Church eight years and some months.

In the seventh year of the pontificate of Saint Marcellinus, Diocletian passed the winter in Nicomedia. Galerius Maximian visited him there, after having vanquished the Persians, and wanted to persuade Diocletian to order a new persecution which should everywhere cause paganism to triumph.

The old emperor for a long time resisted Galerius, and pointed out how dangerous it was to disturb the world and to shed so much blood. But Galerius was not to be over­ruled by such arguments, and would have advice; for such was the malignity of his nature that he wanted no advice when he would do good, but always required it when he wanted to do evil—so that he might cast the blame on others. Diocletian, finding that all around him were divided in opinion, sent an aruspice to Apollo of Miletus. Apollo replied —not by the medium of a priestess, but from the depth of a dark cave— that the just on earth prevented him from saying the truth, and that that was the reason why the oracles he gave from the tripod were false. The priestess of Apollo said the same, with her hair dishevelled, and she lamented the misfortunes of the human race. Diocletian asked his officers who were the just on earth. One of those who served at the sacrifices answered: "They are the Christians, without doubt."

The emperor was pleased with that reply, and resolved upon the persecution, being unable to resist the urgings of his friends, of Caesar and of Apollo.

Then commenced the terrible persecution of Nicomedia, of Tyre, of Antioch, of Ancyra, and of Arabia.